Thirteen Tales of Terror
by Kristi
Summary: Stories of horror and fright in the ST universe. (Multi-series)
1. Table of Contents

"Thirteen Tales of Terror"

They can defeat a fleet of Borg, but nothing kills a good urban legend. 

Each story is a standalone.   


Table of Contents

1. "To the Left of Nowhere" (TNG)   
Stuck in space in a broken shuttlecraft. Can they trust the good samaratin who stops to help? 

2. "Ferengi Foobar" (DS9)   
Quark tells the tale of a most unusual transaction. 

3. "Live by the Dollar . . ." (TNG)   
Will and Deanna are on their honeymoon when Deanna senses something not quite right. 

4. "Space Travel Gets Under Your Skin" (TNG/VOY/misc)   
Starfleet Medical reports the following . . . 

5. "Haunted Holosuite" (DS9)   
Nog and Jake sneak into the holosuite, but what they encounter is more than they expected. 

6. "Joy Ride" (VOY)   
Harry and Libby leave the safety of Tycho City to explore the dark side of the moon. 


	2. To the Left of Nowhere

"To the Left of Nowhere"

Tristan was a young man of wealth and privilege. His father owned the largest shipping conglomerate in the tri-galactic area; his mother sat on the Interplanetary Council. Tristan himself was lithe and dashing with boundless confidence; he could have any girl he wanted, and Tristan wanted Mari. 

Mari was a young woman just growing into her new good looks and was still surprised when young men noticed her. When the rich, cute, popular Tristan asked her out, she gaped in awe before stumbling out, "Yes." 

Tristan picked Mari up in his Starhopper-class shuttle the *Rebellion* and took her to the Cloud Room, a restaurant six kilometers in the sky, where Mari watched the world revolve below them through the transparent aluminum dance floor. 

After drinks and dinner and dancing and more drinks, Mari's head was spinning from alcohol, being surrounded by aristocrats who frequented the Cloud Room, and Tristan's gyrating proximity on the dance floor. He really does like me! she thought. 

"I want to see the stars," Mari said. 

Tristan blasted the *Rebellion* away from the Cloud Room at top sublight then accelerated to warp one the second he cleared the planet's moon. The stars smeared at Tristan's command; the sheer force of the jump pushed Mari back into her seat. Tristan's hands were strong and sure as he caressed the controls. 

"Let's see what's shakin' over at Gamma Seventeen," Tristan said. 

Mari hesitated; her father had forbidden her from Gamma Seventeen – the next closest star system – since the Dominion had annexed Alpha Seventeen. A Starhop was a fine civilian vessel, but it could only reach warp one; if they got into trouble, any military-owned ship could outrun them. . . . 

"I don't know, Tristan," Mari said hesitantly, even as the shuttle soared past her star system's familiar planets and launched into the dark, abandoned sky beyond her home. 

"Hey, sweetie, I'll be okay," Tristan said, gazing into her eyes and flashing that perfect smile. He ordered some more tulaberry wine from the replicator. "Trust me, I've gone there a million times. The third planet has the most warp danceclub you've ever seen. I really want to take you there," he added sincerely. 

Mari smiled and sipped her wine. "All right," she said. "I always worry too much." 

"Trust me, babe, it'll be –" *thud*. The *Rebellion* careened, stars swirling in the viewscreen. 

"What was that!" Mari gasped. 

"I – I don't know," Tristan said, his hands shaking as he took the *Rebellion* to a full stop. 

"Warning," the computer said. "Hull breech on outer dorsal shell. Emergency shields engaged." 

"Something hit us," Tristan said. 

"We'd better go back," Mari said. All her courage had been stripped away by the threat of being sucked into space. 

Tristan didn't answer, his face twisted in annoyance to cover up the same fear Mari's face made so obvious. Tristan laid in a course for home, but when he pressed *engage*, the computer beeped a warning noise and said, "Engines off-line." 

"Why?" Tristan demanded. 

"Excess stress will cause further damage to hull breech. Please execute emergency procedures." 

"What does that mean?" Mari said. Panic clenched her heart – she swore never to let her feet leave the ground again. 

"We're stuck," Tristan said. 

There was nothing that could be done, except send out a distress signal and wait for someone to answer. They were on a common trade route, although traffic between systems had thinned considerably since the war. Tristan looked out of the viewscreen at the dark, empty space and told himself that someone would be along soon. 

After two silent hours, an enormous, purply-blue starship descended upon the *Rebellion* and hailed them. The captain, of an unfamiliar alien planet but with a kind voice, offered to assist them. 

"Can you can tow us back to our planet?" Tristan asked. 

"Why don't you let us just fix your ship?" the captain said magnanimously. "We've got plenty of extra hull plating; really, it's no bother. It'll take us an hour or two, then you kids can be on your way." 

"That's awfully nice of you," Mari said. She just wanted this nightmare to be over. 

"Well, I'm a nice guy," the captain said. "And my maintenance crew could use an excuse to get off their butts. I just need someone to beam over here to give us your ship's specs, and then I'll send out some guys in EVA's to tack on a new hull." 

"Sure, you can beam us right over," Tristan said before Mari could politely protest. Tristan closed the channel. 

Mari hissed, "Are you insane? You want to beam over to a ship whose planet we've never even heard of? They could be Dominion!" 

"Whoever they are, they're fixing my ship for free," Tristan said. "Besides, what would the Dominion want with a civilian shuttle? Look, if you're that worried, you stay here. I'll call you if there's trouble." 

"But –" Mari protested. 

Tristan sighed. "And I'll put up the deflector shields. The EVA's will be able to go through them, but no phaser blasts. Just push this button after they beam me out." 

"All right," Mari said. 

Tristan spoke briefly with the alien captain again and then disappeared in a golden transporter column, leaving Mari in the cramped shuttle. Minutes of silence turned into half an hour, and no call from Tristan. 

"*Katanga* to *Rebellion,*" the radio crackled to life. 

Mari jumped. "Yes?" 

"We're about to start work on your hull. Don't be surprised if we make some noise," the alien captain said. 

"All right," Mari answered. Almost immediately, she heard pounding and scraping on the ceiling. 

Sleepy from all the alcohol, Mari decided to stretch out on the wide, overstuffed seat in the back. She soon nodded into a shallow sleep full of fitful dreams of invading Jem'Hadar. She woke frequently when the pounding and scraping above became too insistent. 

Sometime later, Mari woke to the alien captain's voice over the radio again. 

"Sorry about that, miss," he was saying. 

"Excuse me?" Mari asked. It was then she noticed that the cabin had gotten cooler and some of the control panels were as black and lifeless as the dark space outside the viewport. 

"My guys hit a relay and knocked out some of your computer systems," he said. 

"Oh," Mari said. The shuttle was still empty and silent. Why wasn't Tristan back? 

"We're real sorry, miss. Tristan asked you to message your planet to let your parents know where you are." 

"Oh. Okay," Mari said. "Um, how do I do that?" Mari's knowledge of shuttle operations extended to telling the computer to do things for her. 

"Oh, you probably lost computer voice interface, huh? Sorry again. We'll send the message from our ship, then." 

"Thank you," she said, even though it was their fault for breaking the computer to begin with. 

Panic began to rise in her chest. Without the computer, she couldn't call for help, or even adjust the environmental controls. What if the aliens *were*, and she was waiting patiently for their fleet to show up. 

How cold could it get in a shuttle? Mari suddenly realized how very small the shuttle was – her head almost brushed the ceiling. Why weren't there any more ships around? The interior lights flickered half-heartedly, ignoring the oppressive fear of darkness filling Mari's chest like a bubble. Like the vacuum of space would feel expanding her lungs. 

Do people who get sucked out of spacecraft know what space feels like? Do they actually feel the pressure build? Mari had read once of fish that live at the bottom of the ocean who are so used to the extreme pressure that if they get caught in a deep-sea net, the explode before they reach the surface. Mari imagined the ceiling of the shuttle peeling, groaning, renting, and pulling her into the deadly night. Would she feel cold? Or would her nerve endings lie and call space hot, like the time in biology lab when she touched the nozzle of the liquid nitrogen tank on a dare. 

The scraping and clanking thuds above her head started up again. Mari flopped into the seat, exhausted and frightened but was too nervous to sleep. 

She must have dropped off, though, because some time later she woke to silence. The computer was still unresponsive. She didn't know how to work the sensors, but a glimpse out of the viewscreen revealed a debris field that had not been there before. 

"Shuttle *Rebellion*, please respond." A voice suddenly filled the cabin. 

Mari shrieked before she realized the voice was coming over subspace radio. "Hello?" Mari said. "Um, this is the *Rebellion*." 

"This is Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation starship *Enterprise*." 

"Uh. Hi," Mari said. 

"With whom am I speaking?" 

"My name's Mari. This isn't my ship," she explained. "It's Tristan's. He beamed over to that alien ship and he isn't back yet. Did they finish fixing the hull?" 

There was a pause on the line. "No," Captain Picard finally said. "Your shuttle still needs assistance. We would be happy to tow you back to your system, but for safety's sake, I would like to beam you over to the *Enterprise*." 

Mari nodded. "All right, but we should really wait for Tristan to get back." 

"And whom is that?" Captian Picard asked. Someone on his ship whispered something like, 'the humanoid remains.' 

Captain Picard sounded tense when he insisted that he needed to speak with Mari in person. 

In the *Enterprise's* observation lounge, where she sat at a long table with Captain Picard and several of his staff, Mari could see through the tall windows that the debris field was purply-blue and starship-sized. 

"Can someone please tell me what the hell is going on?" Mari asked. 

"I'm afraid I have the misfortune to tell you that we could not rescue Tristan," Captain Picard said. 

"When you spoke with the captain who offered to fix your ship," the woman who had introduced as Counselor Troi asked gently, "Did you speak with him on-screen?" 

"No," Mari said, "His transmissions were audio-only." 

The Starfleet men and women looked uncomfortable. 

"Why?" Mari asked. 

"The aliens were Quarnoths," Captain Picard said. "They are, ah, serpentine in body construction." He seemed to be having trouble finding the right words. "When we boarded, the situation was most unfortunate. When we found Tristan, he had -- " the captain's mouth twisted oddly "—he had been killed. Our people barely made it out with their lives, and when the ship fired on us, we were forced to defend ourselves. You were lucky they didn't beam you out of your shuttle, too." 

"They couldn't have," Mari said. "Tristan put up the deflector shields." 

"That explains the hull," a bearded man at Picard's left said. To Mari, he explained, "The deflectors saved your life; the Quarnoths were trying to physically hack through the shuttle to get you out." 

"But why?" Mari asked. "Why did they want us?" The alien captain had acted so nice, even inviting Tristan over for dinner. 

Before his co-workers could shush him, a gold-skinned man said, "Quarnoths are known to consume humanoids." 


	3. Ferengi Foobar

"Ferengi Foobar"

Hello. Welcome back to Quark's Bar, Grill, Casino, and Holoresort. Can I get you the usual? 

Have you seen Security Chief Odo? Oh, no reason. He was in here earlier, questioning me about those poor Bajoran vedics. I told him, I'm just the middleman. How am I to know if a crate of vedic robes was infested with Klingon fire-spider eggs? 

I see you find that story amusing. That's nothing. You should hear what Morn told me the other day. 

Do you remember the Vulcan merchant who was hanging around here last week? Funny guy, even for a Vulcan. 

Funny how? Well, for once thing, he frequented my bar. Used to leave with someone every night, too, and almost always a different species. He inquired about people's health a lot, too; not normal stuff like, "I hope your spacedust allergy is clearing up." More like, "Do you frequently overimbibe Katerian whiskey?" But he was a paying customer and never bothered anyone except his object of affection of the night, so I served him his soft drinks and let him and his consenting adult do whatever. You don't get far in this business if you pass judgment on every oddball who comes into your establishment. 

Anyway, a week later, the Vulcan leaves the station, but not before asking me if I could hold onto a shipment of supply parts for him until his business partner showed up to pick them up. I charged the Vulcan my usual storage fee, plus a small honorarium for allowing someone else to pick it up. 

Then Odo shows up here asking me questions. Had I met the Vulcan merchant, when did I talk with him last, what did we talk about, that sort of thing. I told Odo the truth, and he makes me leave my bar during happy hour to go down to the cargo hold. Odo has me open up the Vulcan's crate, and what do we find in there? Jars and jars with people's names on them, like a Starfleet officer who had gone AWOL, a Bajoran prostitute whose friends had reported her missing, the list goes on. And what's in em? Cryogenically frozen organs. 


	4. Live by the Dollar

"Live by the Dollar . . ."

What with the destruction of yet another *Enterprise*, and setting up shop on the *Titan*, Will and Deanna Riker didn't take their honeymoon until almost a year after their wedding. 

They decided on a lovely tropical resort in South America, Earth, where the sun shone daily, the beaches were secluded, and the water was crystal clear. When they weren't together – which wasn't often – Deanna slept in the sun on the beach with a book and a chocolate daiquiri and Will played volleyball with the other vacationers. They dined in out of the way restaurants run by accented locals. There was a daytrip to the rainforest to see the lush flora and the singing birds; and a shrieking, giggling encounter with a tiny, frightened gecko in the sitting room. But they spent most of their time in their tiki-décor hotel suite. 

Deanna didn't like the room from the start. 

"I don't know why," she told Will, "I just get a strange feeling from it." 

"Strange how?" Will asked. 

The couple in the adjacent room started up again. "I thought you would be able to relax here!" a man's voice howled. A glass shattered against the wall in reply. 

"I sense pain," Deanna said. 

"I love how caring you are," Will said, pulling her into his arms, "but you can't help everyone." 

Deanna cast a concerned glance at the shared bedroom wall where, on the opposite side, unhappiness lurked. She nodded, and they went to bed. 

That night, she dreamed she was in their quarters on the *Titan* and people on the deck below were pounding on the ceiling, begging to be let up through the floor. She woke with a gasp. It was still the middle of the night. Will snored beside her like a photon torpedo stuck in the tube. A heaviness weighed upon her mind, like a being in terrible trouble. Deanna tried to parse the strange emotion from the matrix of humanity pulsing through the hotel; the passion, anger, and dreamy confusion was like being lost in a fog. A thread of terror wisped along the bottom . . . but Deanna couldn't get a grasp of it. Then the emotion was gone, smeared into the mist like charcoal on paper. 

* * * 

They stayed in bed half the day and then went shopping at an open market reputed for its beautiful handicrafts. Will bought his bride an exquisitely woven silver bracelet with heart-shaped beads nestled in the filigree. 

Back in their room to change for dinner, Deanna felt odd, as if someone was in the room, watching her. She sensed a presence . . . somewhere. She opened the closet door. Arms encircled her from behind and she yelled. 

"Sorry," Will said, and kissed her collarbone. Deanna pulled out of his embrace. 

"What's wrong?" Will said. 

"I don't know. I keep sensing something really wrong with this room." 

"It's probably nothing—" 

"Will, it may have been nothing a day ago, or a week. But we've been here ten days and it isn't going away. I'm calling hotel security." 

Two security people searched the room with scanners. 

"What're we looking for, Ma'am?" one asked Deanna. 

"I don't know, exactly. Actually, the feelings I was sensing have gone away. Maybe I was just being paranoid," Deanna said sheepishly. 

The other security office's scanner bleeped. "This is weird," she said. 

At the foot of the bed, adding to the hotel's "seaport" motif, was a decorative trunk. The security officers opened the trunk to reveal, stuffed inside, a Ferengi. The security officers called the medics who determined that the Ferengi had died less than an hour before. 

Two Onarian drug runners were later arrested for the crime; the Ferengi had apparently run out of time to pay back a debt and was attacked and left for dead in the trunk. However, the Ferengi hadn't died; his alien physiology allowed him to hang on for almost two weeks, flittering in and out of consciousness, unable to call for help.   



	5. Space Travel Gets Under Your Skin

"Space Travel Gets Under Your Skin" 

Starfleet Medical reports the following: 

=^= CMO of starship *Voyager* reports incident in which he discovered a deceased insect larvae of unknown origin on the floor of Sickbay. CMO found several more upon tricorder readings, but could not determine the origin, until he scanned himself. Days ago, CMO went on an away mission to an alien planet and encountered a highly adaptable kind of carnivorous beetle. It laid eggs underneath the CMO's synthetic skin, which hatched and burrowed; some of which fell out of the holomatrix onto the floor. Turning off the holographic doctor resulted in a hail of hundreds of larvae and adult insects, which took several days to be completely eradicated and in that time infested many more members of the crew. 

=^= All Starfleet personnel are prohibited from vacationing on Risa until the planet's cayfly infestation is controlled. The cayfly is a parasitic aquatic insect, less than two centimeters long, who is known to swim into humanoid bodily cavities, use their spiny tentacles to latch themselves onto the cavity wall, and consume the host's flesh and blood. In extreme cases, the patient may hemorrhage until death. 

=^= Lt. Geordie LaForge, the first man to be fitted with prosthetic eyes constructed using Borg technology, discovered Borg nanites in his body when he woke to find they had built Borg prosthetics on the side of his face. *Enterprise* doctors also discovered a subdermal Borg homing device the back of LaForge's neck. All physicians are asked to scan for this problem with other patients who have been the recipients of Borg-based prosthetic technology. 


	6. Haunted Holosuite

"Haunted Holosuite"

"Did you hear the one about Kodos the Executioner?" 

"Yeah," Jake Sisko said. "Psychotic dictator, had a ton of people killed in a eugenics plot?" 

"Well, yeah," Nog agreed. "But that's not the end of it." 

"I know. They thought he died, but twenty years later –" 

"No, not that!" Nog said. "Everyone knows that. I mean, did you know that he haunts the galaxy now?" 

"No way," Jake said. Jake didn't believe in ghosts. Much. Seventeen was too old to be scared of little kid stuff. 

"Honest," Nog affirmed. "If you go into a broken holosuite and say Kodos' name three times, he'll appear." 

"You don't really believe that, do you?" 

"Well, no," Nog said. "But I bet Josie and Maureen will." 

"I really doubt that," Jake said. Josie and Jake were sort of going out, mostly because they were the only teenage humans on Deep Space Nine; Maureen was a Dabo girl Nog had been trying to get friendly with for months. 

"Maybe not, but it'll be fun to scare them, won't it?" Nog said. 

"Are you nuts?" 

"I'm serious," Nog said. "Uncle Quark says he rents as many scary holosuite programs as sexy ones." 

"Because when the girls get scared, the guys are there to protect them?" Jake asked incredulously. 

"Exactly!" Nog cried, eyes wide. "We tell the girls the story, and then convince them to sneak into the bar after closing time. We'll write a program that makes it look like Holosuite Two is broken, and it'll create Kodos when we chant his name. The girls will have a fit, and we'll be there with waiting arms to protect them!" 

Jake wasn't as sure as Nog that it would work – not from the technical aspect, since Nog was a whiz with holoprograms, but rather that the girls would be all over them – but it sounded like fun, even for just a laugh. 

Several nights later, the four of them snuck into the "broken" Holosuite Two. Maureen giggled on Nog's arm while Josie and Jake hung back, chatting. Even if Josie thought the gag was dumb, Jake decided that she'd be a good sport; if nothing else, it was fun sneaking around in the middle of the night. 

Nog insisted that they ceremoniously stand in the middle of the room, hold hands in a circle (boy-girl-boy-girl) while they chanted "Kodos, Kodos, Kodos!" 

The holosuite transformed from bare walls to an old-fashioned library with books on the walls, a fire in the fireplace, and a tall-backed chair facing away from them. Jake gaped – Nog didn't tell him he was going to write a program this involved. The chair turned around, and in it sat an old man with grey hair and mustache. 

"Hello," the man said. 

Maureen screamed, which caused Josie to scream, which caused Jake to yelp. Nog was silent. 

"Welcome to my home," the man said. No one answered. "My name is Anton Karidian." 

"Jake Sisko," Jake finally said. "This is Josie, Nog, and Maureen." 

"I thought it was supposed to be Kodos," Maureen whispered to Nog. 

"It is. After he escaped, he changed his name." 

"Okay, nice trick, guys," Josie said. "Very funny." 

Kodos looked at her curiously. "What's she talking about?" 

"Okay, Jake," Josie said, "I get it. Very funny. Computer, end program." The program didn't end. 

Nog looked confused. 

"Would you four care for tea?" Kodos asked. 

"Computer, end program," Nog said. 

"Sure, tea sounds nice," Maureen said nervously. To Nog, she said, "You said the holosuite was broken," while Kodos poured tea for five. 

"It isn't broken," Josie said impatiently. "They created a program to scare us." Josie rolled her eyes. "Cute, Jake," she said, "but it's the middle of the night and I'm tired, so let's turn it off, okay?" 

"I didn't create this," Nog said. 

"Nog, give it up. They didn't buy it," Jake said. "Computer, end program." The program remained. Kodos approached them bearing a tray with tea and smiling slightly. "Computer, delete the Kodos character," Jake said. 

Kodos disappeared and the tray of teacups clattered to the floor. The four DS9ers jumped. 

"Well that works," Jake said. "I wonder what else does, too. Computer, door." The door didn't appear. 

"This isn't funny, Jake," Josie said, now officially annoyed. "Let us out now, or we're leaving." 

"Where are you going to go?" Nog said. "We can't get out either." 

The room suddenly went dark. 

"Nog, that's it!" Maureen said. 

"We aren't kidding," Jake said. "Really. We're stuck in here, too." 

"We admit," Nog said, "The holosuite wasn't broken when we came in here." 

"But now, apparently, it is," Jake finished. 

"Well, go find the access panel," Maureen said. 

"The what?" Jake asked. 

"In every holoprogram," Nog explained, "there's a real access panel hidden somewhere, so you can manually shut off the program in an emergency." 

"We're staying here by the fire," Josie said. "You guys got us into this, you can go bumbling around in the dark." 

"Fine," Jake agreed. He picked up an old-fashioned lamp-thing that burned on some kind of clear liquid and he and Nog left the girls in the safety of the firelit library. "Do you have any idea where the access panel is?" Shuddering shadows danced on the walls from the heavy lamp Jake held in his shaking hand. Something thumped behind the wall – did Nog even add a thunderstorm to the program? 

"It's usually hidden somewhere functional-looking, like the kitchen." 

"All right," Jake said. "Where's that?" 

Nog shrugged. "You're asking me? It's your holoprogram." 

"Mine?" Jake said. "No it isn't. You programmed this." 

Nog stopped so suddenly, Jake almost knocked into him. "No, I didn't. I programmed just Kodos to appear. I thought *you* expanded on it." 

"It wasn't me," Jake said. A cold breeze slithered across the back of his neck. 

The boys stared at each other in confusion for a moment before Nog said, "We better find that panel." 

"And quick." 

The boys followed the hallway from one room to the next, opening cabinets and closets, but finding no DS9 station panel. After some time, Nog began to notice something. 

"Do you hear that?" Nog asked. 

"I'm not the one with trumpets for ears," Jake said. 

"It's following us." 

"What is?" 

"A noise. Like footsteps, sort of. On the other side of the wall." 

"Your Ferengi hearing is probably just picking up noises outside the holosuite." 

"I don't think so. It's always on the other side of the wall to our left. It's the same sound, no matter how far down the hallway we go." 

"We aren't really walking down a hallway," Jake reminded him. "We've probably only moved about two meters in the actual holosuite." 

Nog nodded reluctantly. "I guess you're right." 

A thud so heavy it shook the walls echoed through the hall. Nog clapped his hands over his ears. 

"Thunder," Jake said. "Just thunder." 

"'It was a dark and stormy night. . . .'" Nog quoted grimly. 

"It's just a holoprogram," Jake said, more to himself than to Nog. "I think I see the kitchen," Jake said. 

The storm picked up as the boys searched the cupboards. Flashes of lightning gave tantalizing glimpses of tall trees and unruly bushes outside the window. The wind rattled the old windowpanes, and something kept hitting the side of the house. 

"Nog," Jake said. "Have you ever heard of a broken holosuite only responding to *some* commands? Isn't it usually all or nothing." 

"No," Nog said. "But then, I've never seen a holoprogram write itself, either." 

"Maybe we somehow got into someone else's holoprogram," Jake said. 

"Maybe," Nog admitted. But Uncle Quark kept the holoprogram chips under the bar. He turned around just as a flash of lightning cracked through the room, illuminating – "What the hell!" 

Nog pointed. Kodos stood in the middle of the room. 

"Where the hell did you come from?" Jake asked. 

Kodos didn't answer. In a blink of lightning, the boys could see him open a drawer. It was then that Nog realized that Kodos was flat and slightly translucent. 

"Looking for something?" Nog asked. "Teacups, maybe?" The lightning flashed again, and Kodos was gone. 

"Where the hell is that panel?" Jake snapped. 

As the boys searched the cupboards, they heard a piercing female shriek from another part of the hall. They both yelped. 

"Josie?" Jake called. "Maureen?" No answer. 

"Help me find the panel!" Nog cried. 

Jake opened another cupboard and blessed DS9 technology appeared behind it. He hollered for Nog, who flew across the room and pounded the keypad so hard his fingers hurt. 

The mansion dissipated to blank holosuite walls. The same shriek filled the room, much closer this time. 

"Oh God – no!" Jake screamed. 

Nog spun around to see, two meters away, Kodos, a knife to Maureen's throat, as she stood frozen, too frightened to struggle. Josie already lay on the floor in a pool of blood. 

Nog and Jake leaped at Kodos, but they were too late – with a practiced, sweeping motion, he dragged the knife across Maureen's throat. Blood sprayed from her neck in a waterfall. She slumped to the floor. Kodos grinned at the horrified boys, and disappeared.   



End file.
